


The Still Point

by eponymous_rose



Category: Sarah Jane Adventures
Genre: 1000-3000 words, Canon - TV, F/M, Family, Fluff, Humor, POV Third Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-15
Updated: 2009-11-15
Packaged: 2017-10-02 23:10:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,367
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11691
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eponymous_rose/pseuds/eponymous_rose
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He sees the universe in her, the turn of the planet and possibilities stretching on into infinity.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Still Point

Inertia, she supposed you might call it. Not doing anything by halves; no slowing down or speeding up; a study in extremes.

For a moment they were surrounded by happy chatter, wrapped up in Clyde's verbal gymnastics as he dodged from each of the day's perils to the next, avoiding any suggestion of real danger, though Luke's stifled protests and Maria's nervous additions told the story well enough.

And then they were alone; Sarah had the rushed impression of Clyde dragging Luke into the house to show him something "wicked" on the Internet that would probably warrant Mr. Smith's intrusion before too long, and Maria was trailing after them, winking a promise to keep them out of trouble, and the stillness of the night air was broken by a faint breeze, blowing round the door's hinges.

Alan was still standing in the doorway, and she knew that his baffled expression must be the mirror image of her own. "They do move fast, don't they?" she said.

He rolled his eyes. "You think that, you should try getting Maria out the door in time for school on a Monday."

And, just like that, the world was set in motion again; it was the most natural thing to invite him in for a cuppa, and it was just as natural for him to accept with an easy laugh. The gentle bustle of activity, the rattle of cups and splash of water and good-natured debate over who should pour what, was stillness in comparison with the rush of excitement and fear and dread when Luke and the others had been late home that night. Everything was easier, smoothed over, a bit surreal in comparison.

"I wish they wouldn't," Alan said, after the tea had cooled and even the dregs of small-talk had been exhausted.

For a moment, she slipped into the defensive, raised her guard, and she was speaking to Harry and the Brigadier and her old school chums again. "It's a big universe out there. They've every right to explore what it has to offer. Well, certainly, there's some danger in it, but without risk-"

He glanced up at her, and even the light of relief had faded from his face; in that moment he looked tired, and she wondered how she must look to him. "I don't believe you really mean that."

"No," she said, and was startled to find it was true. "No, I don't really mean that."

They sat in silence for a long moment, contemplating the lukewarm tea and the sound of surprised laughter from upstairs. "If anything had happened to Luke," said Sarah after a moment, and the words felt like they couldn't escape her mouth fast enough, "I don't know what I would have done."

He glanced away, and the journalist in her noted how the clichéd words had struck home; parents couldn't talk about these things in words that weren't safe, then, that weren't old and nearly meaningless, couched in tradition and old movies where nothing awful really happened. And he was smiling, now, giddy with relief, and for an instant she remembered the first time she'd peered through a telescope, winking out the moon and stars.

"They're great kids," he said, and she envied him his lifetime of pride, of worries, of joys and sorrows, and then she thought of roads stretching forward, of adventures yet to come, and she was smiling back.

"The greatest," she said.

He caught the wistfulness in her tone, and launched into a story about Maria's first day of school, complete with anecdotal details that would probably make an excellent case for blackmail, and they laughed until Luke came down the stairs to ask if they were all right.

Much later, when the laughter upstairs had faded to the dull murmur of the serious type of conversation teenagers have past a certain hour, Alan leaned forward and said, "What's it like, out there?"

Sarah had a flash of an overlong scarf, and smirked. "Partly cloudy, I should think."

He rolled his eyes. "Very droll. I'll be more specific: what's it like in outer space?"

"It's big," she said, and laughed when he reached for a cushion to throw at her. "No, I mean it! It's just so incomparably huge. That's the first thing you notice."

"All right," he said, grinning, "and what's the second?"

"How incomparably small _you_ are," she said. He raised an eyebrow, and she felt an absurd blush rising in her cheekbones. "No, I didn't mean _you_, personally-"

"Well, that's some relief. And here I was worrying that travel to the stars meant finding out all about how tiny and insignificant Alan Jackson is."

Sarah laughed, still unaccountably flustered. "Quite the opposite, in fact. Because coming back means putting everything back into perspective, looking at the world with new eyes, seeing everything as larger than life."

He cleared his throat. "Still speaking personally, are we?"

She threw a cushion at his head with deadly intent, and waited until he'd finished ducking to throw the second one.

"Ow."

"Ooh, there was a button on that one, wasn't there?" She winced as he rubbed his forehead. "Sorry."

"I think I probably deserved it," he said ruefully.

"I think you probably did."

The night wore on, and at some point Alan noted that tomorrow was a school day, and they marched upstairs to discover that Clyde had managed to secure an invitation to stay the night, and Maria was already pulling her overnight things from her rucksack.

"I suspect there's been some premeditation here," said Alan. "Outwitted by my own daughter!"

"You don't mind, do you, Mum?" said Luke, and Sarah couldn't help laughing at his earnest expression. She hugged him in reply, ignoring Clyde's manly protests at the sight of his friend so beleaguered.

And then she and Alan were at the door again, and she was promising to have Maria home by seven in the morning, come what may, and he was laughing but looking a little wistful, a little lost at leaving behind the happy noise of the attic.

His voice became serious, then, and she expected all sorts of things to follow, all sorts of terrifying and wonderful things, but instead he said, "I wonder if I'll ever see what you've seen. Out there, all those stars and planets and civilisations."

"There were some terrible things out there," she said, and softened at his faint smile. "No, but on the whole it truly was wonderful. It was- it was like waking up in a whole new life, every day different and new and full of things you could see a thousand times over and never get bored. And you'd look up, sometimes, and there'd be twelve suns in the sky, and you'd wonder if people ever slept there, if it ever got dark enough, and then you'd wonder whether the people had to sleep at all, and you'd start to think what that would be like, never having to sleep. It's an infinity of possibilities - and it's realising that, no matter how far you may go, no matter how many wonderful things you see, you'll still only be glimpsing a fraction of a sliver of what's really out there."

Alan smiled, looking a bit startled at the outpouring of emotion in her words. "It sounds amazing."

"Oh, it is," she said, and, surprising even herself, reached out and touched his cheek, running fingers down the jawline to the chin and back again. "And that's why this is so wonderful."

His breath was catching in his throat; she could feel the whisper of his words against her fingertips. "What is?"

"The fact that there are worlds and worlds out there to explore, and I would walk away from them in an instant if it meant a night like this one. A wonderful, ordinary night like this one."

He breathed, and she listened, and her hand on his lips was cool in the night air, and finally he smiled and reached up to take her hand in his. "Most people wouldn't call waiting up for their alien invasion-repelling children 'ordinary'."

"Exactly," she said, and kissed him, and the universe obligingly drifted to an end.


End file.
